January 12, 2020: Your Mission, Should You Choose to Accept It
January 12, 2020 Rev. Rhonda Blevins, DMIN
Your Mission, Should You Choose to Accept It
Isaiah 42:1-9
Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen, in whom my soul delights;
I have put my spirit upon him;
he will bring forth justice to the nations.
He will not cry or lift up his voice,
or make it heard in the street;
a bruised reed he will not break,
and a dimly burning wick he will not quench;
he will faithfully bring forth justice.
He will not grow faint or be crushed
until he has established justice in the earth;
and the coastlands wait for his teaching.
Thus says God, the Lord,
who created the heavens and stretched them out,
who spread out the earth and what comes from it,
who gives breath to the people upon it
and spirit to those who walk in it:
I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness,
I have taken you by the hand and kept you;
I have given you as a covenant to the people,
a light to the nations,
to open the eyes that are blind,
to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon,
from the prison those who sit in darkness.
I am the Lord, that is my name;
my glory I give to no other,
nor my praise to idols.
See, the former things have come to pass,
and new things I now declare;
before they spring forth,
I tell you of them.
“Your mission, should you choose to accept it . . .”
You may recognize this iconic line from the TV and Movie series, “Mission Impossible.” The television series began in 1966, with a revival of the series in 1988. Then the hit movie series featuring Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt began in 1996. Did you realize Cruise has done six “Mission Impossible” movies? And Cruise is getting older. If he keeps making these movies, we’ll soon see him as Ethan Hunt on a walker; his mission (should he choose to accept it) will be to remember why in the world he went into the kitchen.
“Your mission, should you choose to accept it” in these films is always the launch point for a great adventure. The mission is clearly explained, but it’s always dangerous. It always entails struggle and intrigue. It always involves romance and betrayal. Who can be trusted? How will this impossible mission be accomplished?
People watch the films not because they want to be Ethan Hunt, but because they (we) relate to the archetypal story line—the hero’s journey. We may not be Ethan Hunt, we may not want to be Ethan Hunt, but each of us sees ourselves as the hero or heroine of our own story. We are all too familiar with danger, struggle, intrigue, romance, and betrayal.
If only our task—our mission was clear like Ethan Hunt’s! If only we could hear a voice saying to each of us, “Your mission, should you choose to accept it.” Then we would know just what to do. With laser like focus, we could walk boldly in that way despite the danger inherent in the task.
But guess what? Our mission, as people of faith, is pretty darn clear. The question is, will we accept it?
The passage I read from Isaiah 42 is written as a work of hope to encourage a despondent people. The recipients of this word of hope are Hebrews who have seen their homeland defeated, the city of Jerusalem decimated. The best and the brightest among the Hebrew people are living in exile as captives in Babylonia (modern day Iraq). It’s hard to imagine the horrors they experienced as Jerusalem fell—the continued horrors of living as slaves in a foreign land. They must have wondered if their God had abandoned them. Or perhaps their God was weaker than Marduk, the Babylonian god.
While it may be difficult for us to comprehend the extent of the Hebrew’s suffering, we understand hopelessness. We understand doubt. Maybe at some point you’ve wondered if God had abandoned you. Or maybe you’ve wondered if science and faith are compatible . . . maybe science seemed to offer a more powerful argument than faith. Surely the decline of the church in America over the past decade or two is indicative of people giving science the win without doing the work to understand how faith and science are completely compatible.
Into the doubt and into the hopelessness of the people in exile, the prophet offers hope in the form of one who would come to restore justice to the people. Listen to how many times the prophet uses the word “justice” in the first four verses of this passage:
Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen, in whom my soul delights;
I have put my spirit upon him;
he will bring forth justice to the nations.
He will not cry or lift up his voice,
or make it heard in the street;
a bruised reed he will not break,
and a dimly burning wick he will not quench;
he will faithfully bring forth justice.
He will not grow faint or be crushed
until he has established justice in the earth;
and the coastlands wait for his teaching.
Three times! Is there any question what the servant’s mission is going to be when he comes?
Scholars like to debate who this “servant” is that the prophet promises. Some suggest it was an individual known to the prophet, or someone alive at the time of the writing. Others suggest the “servant” was the community itself. Early Christians, most notably the Gospel writer Matthew, interpreted the servant manifesting in the person Jesus of Nazareth. Matthew, in fact, quoted part of this passage in Matthew 12:18-21, in reference to Jesus fulfilling this prophecy.
Me? I’m inclined to hold open the option that perhaps all three understandings of the “servant” are accurate. Not either/or but both/and. That there are multiple layers of meaning in the prophet’s words, some likely beyond what the prophet could conceive. So yes, maybe there was an individual in the 6th century who would restore justice. Yes, the community itself was the servant who would restore justice. Yes, centuries later Jesus would come and restore justice. I’m most intrigued today in the interpretation of the “servant” as the community . . . but not the 6th century community, the 21st century community. That following Jesus as our example, we too would be the servant who would restore justice. It’s clear that restoring justice was Jesus’ mission, and he chose to accept it. As followers of Jesus, restoring justice is our mission too, should we choose to accept it.
Last week, I posed the question, “What breaks your heart?” followed by, “What are you going to do about it?” If you weren’t here last week, I invite you to consider your own response to those two questions. What breaks your heart? Is it the commercials about hungry kids in third world countries? Is it the fires in Australia? Is it thinking about soldiers serving in dangerous situations? Is it people suffering from terminal illness? Something else?
On November 28, 2016 “a raging inferno swept through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and into the city of Gatlinburg . . . killing 14 people and injuring 190 more.” “2,460 structures were damaged or destroyed and 17,136 acres were burned.” This is the area where I grew up and where my family has roots going back generations. These fires broke my heart. I did what I could to respond—I offered what I could. But these fires broke the heart of someone with the means to do far more than me. Her name: Dolly Parton. (Or Saint Dolly as some people from East Tennessee like to call her.) Through her foundation and a campaign Dolly conducted, Dolly distributed over $8 million dollars to 875 people who lost their homes to the fires. Over the course of six months, each recipient was given $10,000 to help them get back on their feet. A study out of the University of Tennessee determined that Dolly provided “the right money at the right time.”[1]
Dolly and I were heart-broken over the same catastrophe. Dolly did something about it!
That’s what it means to restore justice. That’s an example of someone understanding her mission and choosing to accept it.
This mission, this calling, is deeply rooted in our DNA as people of faith. Listen to how the prophet describes this God-given calling from verse 6:
I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness,
I have taken you by the hand and kept you;
I have given you as a covenant to the people,
a light to the nations,
Called. Taken. Kept. Given.
Called by a loving God.
Taken as God’s chosen ones.
Kept in God’s mercy and grace.
Given to care for God’s people.
The prophet elaborates what our “givenness” means:
I have given you as a covenant to the people,
a light to the nations,
to open the eyes that are blind,
to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon,
from the prison those who sit in darkness.
Sisters and brothers, each of us is Called. Taken. Kept. And Given a mission—the mission, should we choose to accept it, is to follow our Lord’s example to restore justice to a hurting world. Will we accept our mission? Will we be the restorers of justice on earth as it is in heaven? Will we pay attention to the Spirit speaking to us through what breaks our hearts? Will we do what we can with what we’ve been given to affect real change?
As called, taken, and kept by a loving God, may we be given to the mission God has made so crystal clear. What an adventure awaits us should we choose to accept the mission! Full of danger, struggle and intrigue. But isn’t that part of “life to the full” that Jesus came to offer?
We know the mission. Let us now accept the mission.
This message will self-destruct in five seconds.
[1]Steve Ahillen, “Dolly’s ‘My People’ money paid off, study shows,” Knox News Sentinel,
https://www.knoxnews.com/story/news/local/tennessee/gatlinburg/2017/11/16/dolly-partons-my-people-gatlinburg-fire-recovery/871908001/